Canada's envoy to Washington says President Donald Trump's administration is interested in a quick deal to end a softwood lumber dispute although Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government sees no imminent agreement.

Meet Symba, a really really - really - fat cat. Weighing in at 35 pounds, this feline is at the Humane Rescue Alliance in D.C. and is need of a home. Staffers of the humane rescue group posed with the 6-year-old fat cat and posted the pictures on social media. In their post, they wrote, staff "has seen a lot - but we've never seen a 35 pound cat!" The cat is available for adoption at its New York Avenue location in Washington, D.C.

An advertising blimp with a lone pilot on board plummeted from the sky on Thursday afternoon during the first round of the U.S. Open at Erin Hills in Wisconsin, according to multiple reports from the scene. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel says the blimp caught fire before it hit the ground in a field near the intersection of Highway 83 and Highway 167, just outside the course.

Scientists have discovered a new kind of antibiotic - buried in the dirt. Tests in animals show that it is effective against drug-resistant bacteria, and it could lead to desperately needed treatments for deadly antibiotic-resistant infections. Almost our entire arsenal of antibiotics was discovered in soil, but scientists haven't gone digging for drugs in decades.

WASHINGTON - A violent shootout on a Virginia baseball field that wounded House Majority Whip Steve Scalise and several others exposed simmering concerns among lawmakers that increasingly toxic political rhetoric is putting them at greater risk in Washington and back home.

WASHINGTON - A federal judge on Wednesday, June 14, ordered the Trump administration to conduct further environmental reviews of the Dakota Access pipeline but stopped short of halting oil-pumping operations pending further hearings beginning June 21. U.S. District Judge James Boasberg handed a limited victory to Native American tribes in North Dakota that had challenged the administration's effort to speed the project, and his dense, 91-page opinion directed both sides to appear before him next Wednesday to decide next legal steps.

When policymakers talk about problems with the nation's jails and over-incarceration, they are often discussing concerns that center on the largest cities. But a new study released Tuesday, June 13, shows that rural jails are growing the fastest and are driving a national increase in jail population. That growth is especially surprising, researchers say, because it comes even as the crime rates in those rural areas remain much lower than their urban counterparts.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions is asking congressional leaders to undo federal medical marijuana protections that have been in place since 2014, according to a May letter that became public Monday. The protections, known as the Rohrabacher-Farr amendment, prohibit the Justice Department from using federal funds to prevent certain states "from implementing their own State laws that authorize the use, distribution, possession or cultivation of medical marijuana."